HBO Surprisingly Bringing Back ‘Eastbound & Down’ For Another Season

HBO Surprisingly Bringing Back 'Eastbound & Down' For Another Season

Having just announced renewals for a second season of “The Newsroom” and a sixth of “True Blood,” HBO’s also now committing to fourth season of “Eastbound & Down.” According to Variety, the Danny McBride comedy “will go forward with eight episodes.”

Unlike Aaron Sorkin’s cable news drama and Alan Ball’s supernatural soap opera, the future of “Eastbound & Down” was uncertain — so much so that when Indiewire interviewed director/co-creator Jody Hill after April’s third season finale, he couldn’t tell us whether or not he thought the show would be returning:

I don’t know if I’ll give you a straight story, but we always pictured the show as lasting three seasons. It’s a kind of trilogy. I think we achieved what we were trying to do when we set out. But I also think “Eastbound” is such a character piece that it could be one of those things where you follow [Kenny Powers] at different points in his life. It doesn’t rely on some big plot point so much that you could never do “Eastbound” again. Right now, we’re not sure. We think it’s going to be the last one, but never say never.

While Hill admitted that HBO “definitely” wanted more of the series, he, McBride and co-director David Gordon Green sounded ambivalent thanks to busy schedules — it was, at Hill put it, “all about if we want to do it or not at this point.” The third season finale of “Eastbound & Down” also ended on a note of closure that would have served perfectly well as a series finale (one that included the choice Kenny Powers line “I’m in a fucking Cameron Crowe movie!”). Still, each season of the series developed its story of a former professional baseball player journeying toward a strange sort of redemption in new, unexpected ways. It’s intriguing to guess (and know you’ll probably be wrong about) where the show will go next.